Xanax, Jerko, Try Some.

Is it national asshole day?

Or is it something local?

Seriously, is there something in the water? Did Palin unleash her hordes of mindlessly angry, so very angry, zombies? Is it Lost withdrawal?

I was making a left turn from a residential road onto the main Palmer-Wasilla Highway. There were cars coming from each direction, it being rush hour and all. So I turned into the middle turn lane instead of pulling into oncoming traffic – you know, like you’re supposed to. The women in the cut-down customized white pickup with the chrome exhaust and low rider tires blew her horn hysterically – and kept blowing it – while waving her arm out the window giving me the tradition asshole salute. She kept this up, screaming out her window at me in red faced rage as she went by, even though it was patently obvious to everybody that I was in the middle lane, did not cut her off, and was never intending to cut her off.  I pulled in behind her, and she drove another mile down the road laying on the horn and waving her middle finger in the air and screaming into her mirror at me – while dialing her cell phone.

I glanced at my son in the passenger seat, he shrugged and laughed. Neither one of us could figure out what this whacked out bitch was on about. But, hey, she was headed towards Wasilla so I figured she was on the way to a Tea Party rally or Palin’s birthday party or something. One asshole does not a trend make.

I got home, my wife called, she was at the gas station down the road. The Mustang wouldn’t start.

Argh!

I grabbed my toolbag and headed down to the corner.

I pulled in next to my wife. As I did so, I noticed that the truck at the far pump had one of those half Confederate, half American, giant bald Eagle super duper uber stupendous Viagra fueled patriotic hard-on window treatments, and painted on the tailgate in large black letters was “Un-politically correct and PROUD of it.”  Do I need to mention that the driver was a shaven-headed thug, vandyked, outfitted in a wife-beater, and complete with with proudly displayed racist tattoos who looked like he was on his way to an Aryan Nation pot luck and cross-burnin’? No?

OK, two assholes in ten minutes then. At least this one didn’t scream at me.

It was the battery cable.  Took about two seconds to get my wife’s car started, she drove off towards home, and as I walked around to put the jumper cables in the back of my truck I realized the guy on the far side of the pump next to me was trying to kill us all.  He kept clicking the pump nozzle like you do when you’re trying to get an exact amount or when you’re trying to top off your tank – except his tank was full. Over full. Gas was pouring out on the ground. He was standing in a puddle of it.

So me being the helpful and friendly and neighborly guy I am said, “Hey, your tank is overflowing!”

He responded with a cheery “Thanks, Buddy!” only it came out sounding more like a surly “Fuck you, I know what I’m doing!” In fact, it sounded exactly like “Fuck you, I know what I’m doing.”

Huh?

You’re pouring gas on your shoes, but you know what you’re doing? Um, OK. I’ll just fuck off then, sorry for bothering you.

Did I mention the guy was about sixty and looked like the Good Humor Man? I thought maybe he was thinking about going all Jihad Martyr on the gas station, if he pulled out a lighter I was going to clock his nasty obnoxious ass with my tool bag.  Instead he got in his truck and drove off leaving behind about ten bucks puddled on the ground.

Seriously folks, what the hell?

If I’d known it was national asshole day, I have gone out prepared.

 

Who’s the biggest jerk you ran into today?